Saturday, December 3, 2011

While he was still in high school in the early sixties his family moved in an old house out in the country. The walls creaked and dark shadows abounded. This was the inspiration for his novel.

He currently lives near the small community of Yakima, Washington with his wife and dog. He has a B. A. Degree in Business Administration and a Master’s Degree in Counseling Psychology. He acquired much of his knowledge about court procedures while working as a child protective services worker for many years. His hobbies include hiking, bowling, and reading a good mystery novel.

His books?

Gary has three books, The Old Miller Place, Return to Painters Island, and The Kidnapping of Olivia Hammond.

In 1961 George Peabody struggles for months to find employment. When he is about ready to give up he lands a job with a small newspaper. He likes the area and talks his wife, Elizabeth; into buying an old rundown house. Objects start moving by themselves and an icy presence permeates the entire house. Is he and his family safe? He researches the old house’s history and learns of grizzly murders that had taken place there.

An attorney is bludgeoned to death and a woman turns up dead in the back of his truck. He is accused of both murders and is on trial for his life. Has he been framed for their murders by a crooked cop, Detective Strausser, or is it someone else? Are the murders of the past somehow connected to what is currently going on?

Suddenly he is abducted by the real killer. It becomes a race against time as a retired police detective, Gary Wise, and his ex-partner, Detective Thayer, search for clues to find him.

"It is in the 1950's and Jim, who is almost nine years old, helps his mom support the family because his dad is too sick to work. He sometimes is allowed to escape to "Painter's Island", a magical place where he can be a kid again. Follow him as he jumps off sawdust piles, digs up buried treasure, has sword fights with his friends, and tries to fly."

With Blood trickling down her face and chained to a basement wall, Olivia Hammond tries to figure out why she was kidnapped. It couldn't be for ransom because she has no money or rich family. Revenge is not a motive either because she is at peace with everyone and always tried to be a good neighbor.

Her only hope is that her brother will discover the truth, but with no food or water, will he find her in time?

Sunday, November 27, 2011

Like the musical intro? I do. Love music. Probably why most all of my titles have song titles. First though, I wanted to thank Kiss for allowing me to guest blog. This is a fun place and I’m glad to be here. Grin.

So why on earth did I chose that title for this post? Glad you asked. ‘Tis the season to be merry. Also, there are a zillion little twinkle lights popping up. And not just on my house! But looking at the twinkle lights and thinking about Christmas makes me think of DH. I won’t get super sappy on you, but yeah, I’m a sucker for Christmas twinkle lights.

I should probably try to work this into a romance story somewhere, but part of me wonders if people would buy into it. Anyway...

Why I Love Twinkle Lights(in 200 words or less.)

When I was in college, first year, I met this guy. He laughed, made BAD jokes and was just plain nice to me. I won’t say I was an ugly duckling in school. I just hadn’t come into my own. He saw past my crazy dyed red hair and my tendency to wear flannel. He liked me as a person.

So he asks me to go with him to Walmart to buy Twinkle lights. We do and pick up this set of running lights that does like 7 different settings. Fine. He’s torn. White lights or color. Now I’m an art major. I like color. I convinced him, not sure how, to buy the colored lights.

He bought the colored lights and I helped him decorate his dorm room. The lights served as mood lighting when we had our first date. Yes, we were in college so money was about nonexistent. Had them for the faint glow when we did naughty things. Heck, when we needed light but were too lazy to turn on the actual lights, because they were across the room, we used the twinkle lights.

College is over. We’ve been married almost 12 years and have a totlet. What about the lights? We still have those lights. I’d like to incorporate twinkle lights into more of my stories as mood lighting and a guy’s version of creating ambiance.I should.

Okay, so if you were counting that was a little over 200 words. Never said I liked to stay within limits. Pill, I am. But when I think of Christmas and see all those little lights...I think of some of the steamy times we had in their twinkly glow.

Bet you won’t look at Christmas lights the same way again.

Want to know more about Me?

When she's not writing the stories in her head, Megan Slayer can be found luxuriating in her hot tub with her two vampire Cabana boys, Luke and Jeremy. She has the tendency to run a tad too far with her muse, so she has to hide in the head of her alter ego, but the boys don't seem to mind.

When she’s not obsessing over her whip collection, she can be found picking up her kidlet from school.

She enjoys writing in all genres, but writing about men in love suits her fancy best.

Currently hanging out every Wednesday and Friday at the Menagerie Authors site, hunting Hotties for the Saturday posts, and working on the next great story brewing in her head! The cabana boys are willing to serve, unless she needs them, but she always need them. So be nice to Javier or he will bite--on command.

Here’s some fun links and my latest work, Under and Over It from Changeling Press:

UNDER AND OVER IT

Rock hero Camryn Tate makes the girls scream, but his roommate, Regan, holds the key to his heart.

What happens when an artist finds his muse?

Regan Finley’s photography makes the local music scene shine. He’s four months from his final exihibition and graduation with a Masters in Fine Art Photography. But instead of preparing for the party, he’s fretting about his exhibition theme—bondage and passion. There’s one other person he wants to make his exhibition come to life, it he can convince his housemate to participate.

Camryn Tate plays the music that makes the young girls scream. he likes being a local rock hero. His time on campus is coming to a close as well. In four months time, he’ll have earned his Bachalor’s of Music degree in composition. The moment he finds out what Regan wants to do for the exhibition Cam has to make a decision. He can let Regan have his commanding way and get the pictures he needs for the exhibition or he could walk away from the best roommate and friend he’s ever known…all because of a little ball of nylon rope.

Friday, November 11, 2011

Grace Elliot leads a double life as a veterinarian by day and author of historical romance by night. Grace lives nearLondon and is addicted to cats, acting as housekeeping staff to five mischievous moggies.

Grace believes intelligent people need romantic fiction in their lives as an antidote to the modern world and as an avid reader of historicals she turned to writing as a release from the emotionally draining side of veterinary work. Her second novel ‘Eulogy’s Secret’ is a story of greed, blackmail and a stolen identity.

Anyone who has visited my blog http://graceelliot-author.blogspot.com will know that I’m fond of historical trivia. So when Kiss kindly agreed to host me and mentioned that she enjoyed my posts on topics such as “Fat or Fiction - how heavy was Henry VIII”, I thought it would be fun to include a little such trivia here!

My second novel, “Eulogy’s Secret”, is set in Regency England. When our heroine, Eulogy Foster, falls on hard times she must find a way to earn a living - and becomes an artist’s model. In this excerpt, our hero the art dealer Jack Huntley, gazes at her portrait.

He [Huntley], or rather Chaucer, had come across the picture by chance. A few weeks earlier, to his amazement, rumors circulated in artistic circles that Tristan Farrell was painting again. Out of idle curiosity Huntley had dispatched his man to Red Lyon Square to investigate, only to have Chaucer return bright eyed and burbling on about a stunning portrait of a brown-eyed woman. It amused Huntley to instruct Chaucer to buy the painting, for an anonymous client of course, as an investment in the resurgence of a once great talent. But the moment Huntley saw the piece he knew he could not bear to part with it.

So here he stood, like a priest before an altar. Goosebumps raised on his arms as he gazed at the pale-skinned beauty with softly parted lips and enormous brown eyes, warm and alluring, staring out of the canvas as if taken by surprise. The swirling background of chocolate browns served to heighten the woman’s natural beauty. The piece was unfinished and yet utter perfection. Only an artist of great foresight would stop when he had, capturing the moment when a great artist discovers his muse. Huntley’s instincts had been correct. The model was Eulogy Foster, and the painting as divine as the woman it depicted.

So in line with our theme of historical trivia and with a tenuous link to artists, I thought to recall the story of the famous painter Whistler. American born artist, James Abbott Whistler (1834 - 1903) famed for paintings such as ‘Arrangement in Grey and Black, the Artist’s Mother’ (and yes, that picture in the first Mr. Bean movie!) was an animal lover. Whistler owned a tortoiseshell cat, but his favourite pet was his French poodle. One day the poodle was taken ill and in a panic Mr. Whistler sought the help, not of a veterinarian, but an eminent ENT surgeon.

Arriving at Whistler’s address, the distinguished doctor was horrified to find the patient was not human, but canine. Begrudgingly he examined the animal and prescribed a course of treatment.

But the next day the doctor sent Whistler an urgent summons. Thinking it was news concerning his favourite dog’s condition the artist dropped everything and hurried over. The doctor greeted Whistler warmly with the words;

“Ah good morning Mr. Whistler, so good of you to call so promptly. I needed to see you urgently about repainting my front door.”

In the four weeks since her guardian’s death, Eulogy Foster has lost everything. She travels to London seeking the help of Lord Lucien Devlin, the estranged brother who doesn’t know she exists. But Lord Devlin turns her out onto the streets, where Eulogy is robbed and thrown onto the mercy of a passing stranger.

Jack Huntley - bitter, cynical and betrayed in love -believes women are devious, scheming creatures and not to be trusted. So when one night he saves a naive young woman from rape, little does he suspect how much life is about to change. Despite his growing attraction to Miss Foster, Jack has a problem: Eulogy Foster has a secret involving his bitterest enemy, Lord Devlin.

As Eulogy learns the haunting story of her mother’s past, she knows she will only marry for true love. Deeply drawn to Jack Huntley, she needs him to confess his love before she shares the secret of her birth. Caught in a deadlock, with neither able to confess their true feelings, events take a sinister turn as it becomes clear someone wants Eulogy Foster dead.

Monday, June 27, 2011

This blog has been inspired by a blog I came across recently: insearchofperfect sentence.blogspot.com by Jan Tarasovic. I tried to insert the link but failed. So, do yourself a favour sometime soon, go over and take a look at her blog.

I've had a lifelong fascination with words. It always amazes me that there is no limit to the new and exciting our ideas ways we can use the same words which everyone understands (and can be translated for most of the rest of the world). Doesn’t it blow your mind that using the same words that all the great masters of writing have used, we can craft stories that can touch every human emotion.

A few well chosen words can bring a strong man to his knees, bring tears to the eyes of a hardened soul, or a smile to the face of the sad, make the heart of a loved one race, calm the panic-stricken or soothe a broken heart. Words are such a powerful sword in the hands of a mastercraftsman/woman. Comedians, playwrights, novelists, poets, do you dare to put yourself in their class?

On offer for one week I have two prizes.

Firstly, for your best-loved but not original sentence, I have a copy of “The Quotable Lover” edited by Nancy Butler.

The second, for a perfect original sentence of your own writing, is a critique, edit and/or proofread by my humble self for ten pages of your own work.

Our Group

The Romantix is a group of writers who meet once a month in the dim hope that it will inspire us to write more efficiently, more productively, more skilfully, more.... well, just more. So far success has varied, yet we persist. Call it stubbornness. We are Zoe, Letitia, Kiss, Gemma, Sarah and Sami, and our romance writing interests comprise fantasy, historical, paranormal and contemporary. Welcome to our little corner of blogland.